Learning more about the horrible surprise attack on Israel yesterday. I don’t know what to say. My heart goes out to my Israeli friends and all  the people of Israel. 

nite all. nite sam

-me

Everybody is still glowing from yesterday.. ..  The house was full and happy. Nothing spells love like a full dishwasher 🙂

 

I refilled the well in prep for 9 showers. laundry etc.. So far I’m proud of the well for doing so “well”.. ugh.. dad joke

 

First order of busienss was a wonderfull yoga class diane gave for all of us. Perfect start for a rainy day

 

Then a huge breakfast made cooperativly by everbody

 

We spent most of the day gettign ready for the pot luck that max and becky had planned to celibrate their wedding.. It was goign to be a small party (50-60 folks) of their Vermont friends.. Most of whom dont evenn knwo that they are married yet. 

The house really looked nice !

 

We knew a few days ago that today would be super raiy.. there was 2″ of rain predicted just for the day.. thats 5% of what we normally get in a year !.. We were prepared though.. Our house is plenty big  enogh for the group who was coming.. Diane  also had the foresight to rent a large tent.. plus our  wonderful friends tim, jen and nate lent us another laarge tent plus a 10×10 popup. Our freind Krista lent us another.  W
e were all set. THe party started at 4PM.. early as our partys go.. but there was a constant stream of people here from 4 – 10PM !.. I think we had about 70 peope all told.   It was so noce seeing so manyu old freinds!

THis was a pot luck so folks braught all sorts of yummy food. Huge thanks to our friends Deb and Jen who prepared a beautiful  spread of middle eastern food with spiced chicken.. We were well stocked. 

At the peak max  and becky stood up and thanked everybody for coming and spoke from his heart about how happy he and becky were to be surrounded by so much love !

Despite the hard rain.. lots of people were outside in the tents as well as inside

Danny and elizabeth are master mixologists.. THye’d braought a bunch of stuff for both alcohol and non alchohol ..cocktails.. fun to watch the process.. and super tasty

 

The party began to wind down around 10:30.. That was a 6 and a half hour party !!!.. 

The last order of business for today was for Max and becky to finish the paperwork for their marriage..  We all gathered round to watch this little bit of the bureaucratic side of love

Everybody helped with the clean up and by the time we all went to bed the house was pretty much put back together again

THe late night crowd moved over to the yoga space for movies. 

 

Diane surprised them with a late night tray of tater tots with cheese.. which was so much appreciated.. 

 

y that time we were nicely tired.. as we headed up to bed I checked our weather station. We’d received  1.7r inches of rain.. and it hadn’t dampened our day a single drop !

Our hearts are full !

Thank you Max and Becky for bringing the party to us !

nite all, nite sam

-me

Max and Becky are officially  married  ! Todays the day they officially signed the ir wedding papers. We’re so happy they decided to do it here in Vermont. .!

It was an amazing day !!!   It was very small just like Max and Becky  wanted. It was ours and Beckys  immediate family, and a few special friends. It was warm, hearfelt and a whole lot of fun !

Everybody pitched in to make the day special. The fact that the wedding venue was just across the field in view of the house made it both special and easy to set up.. We all helped wiht the move of stuff down to the river

Diane backed a delicious carrot caake ( a family favorite) and  Zen and Bidget did the decorations. Zen knows chose only edible flowers to decorate the cake. 

Mason  handled making breakfast..

Outside the tent guys showed up for the pot luck we’re hosting tomorrow.. Good thing as there’s rain in the forcast

 

Max, Gabe , Mason and I decided to take a quick plunge in the winooski to get us in the mood.. I’ll spare you the pictures. as bathing suits were optional . 🙂 

Meanwhile folks were busy with arranging flowers, moving chairs, working on vows, THe house was buzzing with activity !

 

Around 1:30 everybody lined up for the walk down to the river

 

Max and Becky had collected pictures of the people who were here in spirit.  Note: ( the only framed pic I had of my dad has my lovely mom in it.. she’s very , very, very much alive  <3) 

There were 15 or so of us.. so it didnt take long to get seated. We were ready !

 

Gabe was the officient of the day.. He got a one day officiants license from the Vermont govermont website. Hw called us to order.

 

THen we started !

Gabe lead the ceremony so beautifully . He open up his notes in a beautiful leather bound Dungeons and Dragons book and began. His words were so heartfelt . He began by inviting  in Sam and the grandparents and freinds who were no longer wiht us in body.. They were very much with us in spirti. Gabe then talked about the things that make Max and Becky so special.. bit as individual and as a couple. He used the analogy of the roots, trunk and foliage of a garden .. Max’s wonderful quaquaversal   creativity  as the wild roots of the plant and Becky s amazing ability bring things to order. as the strong stems   of the plants.  THe really captured how powerful they are as a couple… manifesting things in the world.. whether it’s moving walls , roofs and floors  of their house.. or the micro farm they’ve built with itsr lush gardens and animals . There were laughs,  smiles and a few tears  . Gabe ‘s comments were absolutely perfect. !!!

Then   Max and Becky exchanged their  vows… they were both so beitiful.. and though they’d not shown them to the other before this moment… they meshed beautifully. Each  spoke so beautifully of their love for the other. They too captured the wonderful synergy they appreciate in each others strengths  and the wonderful combination they are together..    It filled all of our hearts to hear each of them and gabe say  what we all had in our hearts.   

They exchanged the rings.. Max had made Becky’s engagement ring in Cad then had it cast in gold with a beutiful aquamarine which is Beckys birthstone. To make it into a wedding wring, mnax had designed and cast an ingenious white gold  outer ring that went around Beckys engagement  engagement ring. It was incredible that he made such a thing.. but then again.. He’s Max !

Becky presented Max with a Beutiful gold ring that was had a black  sparkling band of nickle iron alloy that was made of meteorites (!!!!)  that had come from Space !!!.   It’s beautiful   Again .. they both captured their partners essence so beautifully and creatively .. 

Then it was them moment !  Gabe said By the power of “https://,.,,, temporary-officiants… .gov. ”  He pronounced them husband and wife !

At that very moment. the bell in our house started ringing.. it was magical.. (actually it was our freind Hannah waiting up there for the magic text message from Nate to begin yanking. the bell rope.. !!!

So, so so great !

 

THe we all hung out hugging and taking pictures of the new husband and bride and of each other 

We all felt Sams presence so strongly

then it was back to the house for a small after party

 

Time for cake !!!  Beutifully decorated by Zen and Bridget.. 100% edible flowers !

 

Gabe went outside and flipped out !

About 4:30 we all piled into cars and drove to our family’s favorite restaurant “A Single Pebble” in Burlignton. We’d rented their partyroom which had 16 places.. the  exact size of our group. We had a delicious  million course dinner that Becky and Max had worked out with the chef a few weeks back. Huge thanks to George and Doreen for hosting this dinner !!!!

We couldn’t eat another thing.. and loaded up on leftovers.. which would last us a week. 

we went out for a postprandial walk around town 

 

 

THis has been such a memorable day.. so much fun and so much love

COngratualtion Max and Bexky .. 

Becky .. We’re so happy to have you as a daughter !!!!

 

nite all,. nite sam .. thinking of you very much today.. as always !

-me

Today was a day of preperation. We now have a houseful of people here and the Neil family up the road at an airbnb. Everyone is busy and happy. 

One iimpact of having so many people around is that our trickle of a well has trouble keeping up with that many showers, flushes, laundry loads and dish runs. TO make it work I used a trick I learned from the folks who drilled our well. I calculated  the static level eg.. how far is the static water level below the surface tin our 525 foot well. To find that I opened the well head and dropped ice cubes down the well. I counted the seconds until I heard the “ploooop” of the ice hitting the water. I then multiplied the number of seconds  by 20 to find the depth.. that worked out to about 120 feet. I then used our neighbors the Rocheleau’s  garden hose to fill the well up with water.. At 1.5 gallons per foot, that gave us about 180  gallons of extra water.. Enough fextra water for showers , etc Win !!!!

 

The house woke up slowly full of happy people

After breakfast, the group went out to scout out a great marriage venue. Max and Becky had been looking around and their first choise was at the intersection of the huntington  and winooski rivers right behind the Bombardier field across from our house.   The whole group walked over there to scout out the site

 

Yeah.. this looks perfect !

 

Then back to the house for some baby cuddling. This is Viviene..Danny and Elizabeths new daughter and  Beckys brand new niece !

 

We fianlly got the time to show all the new folks the house

 

The rest of the day was both busy and calm. Getting ready for tomorrow !Its so fun having a housful of people here !

nite all, nite sam

-me